About Those Syrian WMDs
Dr. Jill Dekker, a NATO consultant on Syrian WMDs says its biological arsenal is designed to be used in a deniable fashion. She calls it their “concept of use” — what we would call doctrine.
Contrary to how the US State Department and other agencies tend to downplay the sophistication of the Syrian biological and nuclear programs, they are very advanced. Syria has always had the most advanced chemical weapons program in the Middle East. The US and other western agencies have in a sense been distracted by this, but their biological programs and the “concept of use” are robust.
Syria’s biological weapons capability today is closely tied to the former and current Soviet and Russian programs respectively, the DPRK, Iran and the former Iraq regime. A major concern is their strategic concept of use – which has gone from one of ‘special weapons’ to incorporation into their ‘conventional arsenal.’ That is a significant shift and one that seems to have eluded the US. The Syrians run their biological programs out of the Syrian Scientific Research Council (SSRC) in Damascus. They have separate wings for separate pathogens. They also have a number of programs running in Aleppo.
The Syrians are 100% committed to deniable operations as their modus operandi. Biological weapons, particularly those which might occur naturally, are the ultimate in deniability, for example, their cryptosporidium program for force reduction. The Wednesday Report noted a few years ago that in terms of the Syrian anthrax program, Syria has extensive expertise in the industrial cultivation of germs and viruses for the civilian production of anthrax (and smallpox) vaccines. It also noted that Russian experts, contracted by Syria, are apparently helping them to cultivate a highly virulent anthrax germ for installation in missile warheads. Their pharmaceutical infrastructure is fully integrated with their defense structure. Syrians cannot reach parity with US and Israeli conventional weapons. However, they view their bio-chemical arsenal as part of a normal weapons program. This is a huge shift in thinking by the Syrian military. It means they condone the use of biological pathogens as ‘offensive’ weapons. NATO and the United States should be very concerned about that re-designation.
One of course wonders how the Syrians could have been coordinating their WMD programs with the former regime in Iraq when Saddam had no such weapons. Nevertheless Dekker says that they received substantial help from the nonexistent program in Iraq.
It is important to remember that the Iraqi programs were far more advanced at the time than what the Syrians had, and were developing. The delivery of certain pathogens in a ‘weaponized’ form taught the Syrians new techniques they previously had not mastered. This is very problematic. I am less concerned about the types of pathogens or specific pathogens as these were available to Syria from other sources. What Hussein’s transfer taught the Syrians was more sophisticated ways of weaponization and dispersal. I believe Russian special ops- their Spetsnaz teams – transported sections of the programs. Remember these are not MIRVed ICBM’s we are talking about – you don’t need to stockpile biological weapons. It is the quality of the pathogen and ‘weaponization’ or aerosolization, milling processes that count, not the quantity. I don’t believe they moved some biological arsenals into the Baqaa Valley in Lebanon, perhaps sections of their chemical and nuclear weapons, but not the biological programs. Those are much too sensitive to dump in the desert. They must be carefully maintained in a defense laboratory. If you take something like Bot – I gram of crystalline Botulinium is estimated to kill about a million people if it were evenly dispersed – you don’t want to bury it out in the desert. …
Well they’ve mastered micro-encapsulation which is necessary for aerosol dispersal. They have experimented with parachute dispersal techniques for orthopox based on Soviet methods. They are also developing micro aerosol dispersal technologies which have no military application. This is probably the most alarming as it is designed for terrorist use. They are also looking at amplifying virulence. Syria wants to develop a very high quality arsenal and a very agile one, hence their crash programs. They do of course have a sophisticated chemical weapons program for which missile delivery is far more complementary. Remember, if you are preparing to do a covert release of a biological agent you don’t necessarily want to use something as traceable as a crop sprayer. The Syrians are perfecting advanced dispersal technologies that will be for use against civilians but far more sophisticated than the use of a crop duster.
Dekker may be alarmist. But speaking of Syria’s chemical weapons program other sources amply confirm the existence of its chemical weapons and their delivery systems. Spiegel announced a chemical weapons test only last August. “The Syrian amy is believed to have tested firing systems for chemical weapons in the desert at the end of August, according to witness reports. The tests apparently took place near the country’s largest chemical weapons facility at Safira.” The test was observed by Iranians, who wanted to verify its functionality.
In August Fox News reported on Israel’s efforts to keep Hezbollah from acquiring chemical weapons and their delivery systems. “It appears the IDF may seek to eliminate Syria’s ability to transport the weapons to proxy forces but not to eliminate the actual weapons themselves by striking at storage facilities,” Idan Kweller, political correspondent for Israel Army Radio, told FoxNews.com. “Israel’s main interest is to ensure the weapons are not passed on to the likes of Hezbollah in south Lebanon.”
If Jordan falls, as Lee Smith argues is possible, then “Jerusalem would lose its remaining strategic partner in the region—having already lost Turkey and Egypt—and face a possible nightmare on its longest border, exposing the country’s center to attacks from the east that might include Sunni Jihadists or Iranian-trained Iraqi agents …”
With a restive Egypt to the south, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Jordan shaky, Israel could be in existential danger. The situation in the Middle East may be far more volatile than the administration is letting on. Recently “Israeli security officials are reportedly examining the possibility that a drone shot down deep in Israeli territory on Saturday may have been despatched in a Hezbollah-Iranian operation and may have been sent to surveil the Dimona nuclear site.” What if Syria and Iran were gauging the degree of Israeli nuclear readiness?
Fortunately we know that Secretary Hillary Clinton and President Barack Obama have everything in hand.
If an ‘unsuspected’ catastrophe occurs from a systematic subordination of intelligence to the political agenda of the Left it will have been a crime of historical proportions. What is the truth? And how can we know it?
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Yes, we can be comforted by the figures of Obama and Uncle Joe. After all, they do know the way to Sesame Street.
how hard would it be to adapt a uav to dispense this nasty stuff? not hard at all i bet. come on israel, time to nuke the mad dogs in your neighborhood.
Yeah maybe but they haven’t used them yet, which makes their existence suspect. In any case I’m sure Israel has them on “oops” warning, if anyone in Israel sneezes Damascus goes boom, questions asked later.
I’m dubious they could run such a dangerous program for years without leaking the results to Hizboolah long since, or simply killing a hundred thousand citizens in industrial accidents.
And again – if anyone in Israel gets a rash, Israel need only hit the stockpiles where they are. Oops.
The existence of the chemical arsenal is not suspect. What is uncorroborated is the size and extent of the biological weapons program. The best case is that Damascus only has chemical weapons. The worst case is that they have these weaponized biological doohickeys.
Two things make me worry. The first is why Assad should be restrained if he is facing the fate of the Duck of Death. He has no incentive to hold back. And before the end, if the biologicals exist at all they will make an appearance as a last ditch threat or bargaining chip.
The other thing is that Benghazi showed that there are things the intelligence community does not know or chooses not to see. Or perhaps it sees them but for political reasons cannot acknowledge them. Even when the blindness will cost them their lives — as in Benghazi — the blinkers prove unremoveable.
Every major war in history has featured a strategic surprise. Pearl Harbor, the Bulge, even the Manhattan Project. If surprise was possible in the past, it is possible today.
That is not to say things are very bad. But how do we bound it? Many things that were unthinkable only a year ago are no longer so unthinkable.
If Syria managed to use biological weapons decisively, this would be the first time they were used as such. Bio warfare is notoriously hard. Syria probably could not pull it off alone, but with Russian assistance the problem persists as a threat.
Does this answer the question for me of why Russia is so committed to Syria? Putin surprises with his strong level of support for that corrupt regime, which seems outsized in relation to any possible benefit for Russia. Syria might be a useful ground for proxy military testing, a la the Spanish Civil War. Russia either thinks that something signifigant is to be gained by supporting Syria, or it has concluded that Western condemnation for that support is meaningless.
Either way that’s bad.
Repeating an often said observation: Each and every time an institution bends truth or spins facts to accomplish its short term goal, confidence in that information eventually erodes. Whether it is the CDC falsely exaggerating heterosexual AIDS, the Bureau of Labor Statistics twisting the employment/unemployment numbers, or the Administration over-estimating or under-estimating intelligence reports or misusing them for political gain, the casualty is confidence in the veracity of all information.
This adds to the perception that there is no truth and that there is little difference between facts and opinions. In the case of the misuse of intelligence information, there will inevitably be some kind of revenge by that community in terms of embarrassing leaks and confidential backgrounders. There is also unnecessarily increased danger to the country.
Do we really deserve the leaders we elect?
Biological weapons can be low budget, terrifying and very hard to counter. Example: March 20, 1995. In coordinated attacks, five domestic terrorists released sarin on several lines of the Tokyo Metro, killing thirteen people, severely injuring fifty and causing temporary vision problems for nearly a thousand others. The five attackers were highly educated Japanese scientists.
Fancy dispersal methods are not a minimum requirement for biological weapons. Think of all the ways to disperse droplets into the air that are in normal household use in suburban areas. Just because a spray can says “Boffo Spray Cleaner” on it doesn’t mean that describes the contents.
The Dekker lady may or may not be using hyperbole, but biological weapons do seem to appeal to the Saddam Husseins and the Bashar al Assads.
I think the Syrian WMDs had only one normal function. To guarantee the existence of the Assad regime. Without it Damascus would have been too vulnerable to conventional attack. The Russians may have provided help in building this capability as the quid pro quo for his cooperation with them. Syria has been instrumental in discomfiting the US in the Middle East and they needed an insurance policy if they were to continue to do it.
My guess is that in the heady rush of the Libyan operation someone or some faction in the Obama administration figured they could do a number on Assad. And maybe they could. But they got lazy and subcontracted it out to the Saudis, Qataris and Turks. And now they’ve got a runaway train.
Now that Assad is facing a the music why should we be surprised that he is reaching or at least brandishing his insurance policy? That’s what it is for. And in case he needs reminding of how much he needs it he can watch YouTube videos of Saddam being dropped or Khadaffy in a meat freezer to motivate him.
Now the US can no longer control whether or not Assad lives or dies. That’s not up to Hillary any more. It’s up to the Jihadis now roaming around Syria. At some point Assad is going to realize that ‘this is it’ and do what he has to do. By leading from behind the Obama administration spun the wheel and they don’t know where it going to stop. But if it stops on Red then there’s a good chance Assad will exercise his policy or what did he buy it for?
So far this year we have had 3 outbreaks in the US. Meningitis, Bubonic Plague and a nasty flu. All deniable.
I suspect terrorists but Biden says there are no terrorists because Obama killed Osama dead.
Ah there I see my webbing thrums
Said the spider to the fly
And in the distance sounds of drums
And fear that I know why
I sense that something is amiss
For now my web is still
And so my friend I’ll tell you this
We have some time to kill
Before the drums finish their song
At which time we will know
Just who it is will say so long
And who is first to go
For there are those who play with death
While others still deny
And so quite soon to draw a breath
Means surely you will die
I care not all for those afar
The trembling fly did say
I beg you leave the door ajar
So I can fly away
The spider’s eyes then filled with tears
She said her nature’s fixed
So kill she must despite her fears
Despite her feelings mixed
You see your most unhappy fate’s
Not your fault in the least
For Allah’s set the mournful dates
It’s just the Middle East
stevesmith @ 7:
Use of sarin constitutes chemical warfare, not biological warfare. Whole different ballgame.
To w. @ 8:
Could it be their own version of the Samson (insurance)
http://tinyurl.com/y92xxc
regards
SF
#6 Batman,
I think you’re describing the slow-motion collapse of legitimacy that the present regime governing the United States is plainly experiencing.
Thing is, eventually that process will run to completion and the nation will have a government that fully and completely expresses the will of the American people, whatever that is.
It won’t be pretty or without dissent, but it will be fully willing to take all possible measures to protect the country from what threatens it.
That isn’t the case now, I suspect.
Perhaps we need to place canaries in subway cars and stations. What else can we do? Buy Duct tape?
The language the Assads and al-Qada speak is tribal. That means that the only way to control their behavior is by threatening collective punishment of their extended family – honor group. Any jihadi is willing to die for his ticket to paradise. Assad is willing to start WW-III to pull the house down around him if he falls. Are they willing to do so if means that their family names will vanish from the earth? If the US announces that every relative of any participant, to the fourth degree, will be anathema then it may dismantle the support structure. If you transport guard manufacture store or deliver these weapons then your cousins will be treated as illegitimate, their property will be forfeit and no court will protect them, their daughters will be unmarriageable, their sons unemployable and uneducated. Let everyone hear that and make it credible.
Here’s what Janes says:
Dr. Danny Shoham of the Begin-Sadat Institute for Strategic Studies writes in August 2012:
But against these assessments Netanyahu has been less vociferous about Syria than Iran. Does he regard the threat as overblown? We know the Israelis are making some preparation for a Syrian or Hezbollah attack, notably in the form of their missile shield.
I think the reasonable answer to these questions is that nobody knows for sure with any great degree of confidence what the absolute truth is. If I were to guess I’d say that Syria has a highly developed chemical warfare system and some biological capability, extent unknown.
When you are leading from the front you can light the fuse and you can blow it out. When you are leading from behind you hand somebody else a box of matches and you can’t blow out the fuse because you are too far back. The very people who are leading the charge on Assad are the very people you want to keep from getting this stuff. It’s a pretty pickle. Too bad nobody saw it coming.
World opinions seems such that use of chemical or biological weapons could be responded to with nukes, we said as much to Saddam.
Also Damascus is seconds away from the Israeli border at Mach 2, while due to distance and size Iran is nearly invulnerable to any but the most desparate attacks by Israel. MAD restrains Syria, but possibly not Iran.
Bio warfare predates DNA sequencing by many decades — even centuries, perhaps.
In all of the prior schema, the agent was presumed to be untraceable.
It is no longer so. (!)
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The other extreme hazard is infinite blow back: the might germs mutate — come what may — into variants that the sponsor is unable to survive.
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As previously posted here, at the BC, my Great-uncle was one of only two survivors within the barracks wherein Spanish flu first broke out.
It went pandemic. It was the real reason WW1 ended 11-11-1918. The black day of the German Army in the west, 8-8-1918, was entirely triggered by run away flu fatalities in the trenches.
ALL WW1 histories are warped because censors suppressed all mention of the flu related fatalities.
The flu is also massively responsible for the post war travails of Poland and Russia.
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The only known tactic for countering a bio weapons program is atomic heat. Thus, any state with germs in its quiver ought to be very circumspect.
Mere conviction that germs are in the offing would justify a counter value strike.
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For reference:
A DC3 can land and take off from a humble strip of straight highway. Further, its low landing speed and ground pressure permits it to land on mere flat ground — of which Libya has plenty.
And, because of its vintage, most ground observers would take any such machine to be adjunct to oil exploration — as against being an ( official ) American asset.
The easiest way to disperse biological weapons by a suicide operative.
Infect suicide agent “X” with disease “Y” and let him get on a plane before the disease becomes observable. He sneezes a couple of times on the plane and infects other passengers who then infect other people. Easy.
11. Cowboy
“Use of sarin constitutes chemical warfare, not biological warfare. Whole different ballgame.”
Yes you are right. Sigh.
The Soviets were looking at biological weapons up until the Soviet Union imploded. I read a story that the Soviets developed a class of ICBM reentry vehicle (RV) intended to deliver biological weapons. That story never made much sense. Why use an RV to spray Small Pox virus over a city when it could just as easily carry a megaton nuke? Also an RV is still supersonic when it hits the ground thus the shock layer around it would still be hot and tend to sterilize a dispersed biological weapon. This makes me believe that biological weapons were not effective as a strategic weapon in the Cold War sense. However it has been established that the Soviets were looking at biological weapons up until their national collapse and in doing so they were violating some weapons treaties made with the US (big surprise).
The Syrians and the Soviets were always close allies during the Cold War. The Soviets liked this arrangement because it provided them with a warm water port and they could sell conventional weapons to the Syrians for hard currency. It’s possible that the Soviets provided the Syrians with biological and chemical weapon information to further strengthen their alliance. However the Soviets were not crazy and handing hyper-virulent weaponized diseases to a bunch of crazy Arabs is not something the Soviets would have done. My guess is the Soviets only gave the Syrians WMD technology that was effectively obsolete, e.g. mustard gas, sarin, anthrax, etc. We know that the Syrians were interested in all WMD technology including nukes. The Syrian nuclear reactor that the Israelis destroyed was probably intended to produce plutonium by irradiating uranium-238 cylinders and then chemically extracting the plutonium through the PUREX process (we used to do that at Savannah River). Fortunately, the Israelis nipped that in the bud. It’s still an interesting question about who was funding the Syrian nuclear program and whether Saddam was involved. Also, of course, there is the issue of Saddam’s WMDs and whether he shipped everything to Syria before our invasion of Iraq. My guess is there was close cooperation between Saddam and Assad concerning WMDs. However Saddam’s WMD program was never that sophisticated, i.e. the technology was mostly at late WW-II level. My guess is the Syrians have lots of chemical weapons like mustard gas and sarin but nothing super nasty like VX. Also I suspect the Syrians have some anthrax but nothing hideous like Ebola, Small Pox or a designer virus. I also suspect the Syrians have tons of lower tech WMDs stockpiled somewhere to display as a counter against Israeli nuclear weapons. This would have been more for bluster than any real strategic application since the Israelis would have nuked the Syrian WMD weapon storage sites if the Syrians decided to be stupid. IMHO there are definitely nasty things in Syria but probably nothing that is a direct threat against the United States or Europe.
If there is live smallpox virus in Syria it is a complete game-changer. Biblical mortality rates worldwide before a vaccination programme of sufficiant scale could be organised.
Surely not. They could only have got it from one place – Russia and surely even Putin wouldn’t be that reckless? And if the Syrians have it then so do the Iranians.
We are also not far off the point where any biology undergrad will be able to cook up lethal new viruses with a $500 desktop gene splicer. Much bigger existential threat than ACG.
Kremlin has viewed Syria and Iraq differently than Libya or PLO, PFLP, Wadi Haddad, etc. Or it’s accidental creation the Islamic Revolution in Iran. Syria is its strategic FOP in the Middle East. Without Russia, no Assad, no Syrian counter-intelligence state, no “rear” for the Arab Soviet-cum-Islamo-Useful-Idiot Revolution, and no retreat for Carlos, Red Army Faction, Japanese Red Army, etc. “Syria” is a strike asset for which the Assad political prostitutes are stage props resembling a state.
The “Syrian Free Army” – what is it? Native Syrians, real defectors, former Syrian regular army and intel? Corrupted by Al Saud, and whatever lottery winning trailer trash runs “UAE,” and etc.? But how – how could these cunning people get in among the headquartered terror groups, themselves penetrated by Syrian intelligence and Soviets (otherwise they would have no weapons or Argentinian passports or money or food or know how wipe their own asses).
So how? Obviously the jihadis got there because they’re already there. Have they been in the lead the whole time? Is this a revolt of the Syrian-headquartered jihadis against their host, dressed up by CNN at the behest of State, while Hillary and Donilon try to impose some order? What if all those defectors have evacuated to France because they recognize that somehow the jihad has come for Assad and Big Brother Rossya can’t stop them?
But at whose instigation is this occuring? Muslim Brotherhood? The main issue is logistics. How are they getting arms and supplies? We know Russia supplies the regime and so does Iran. Russia and Iran would not also arm the jihadis, and certainly not the Syrian Free Army.
I still think its the US behind this. We know how to work with jihadis, obviously. What if its a US-Gulf-Israeli op via Jordan and Turkey?
This all matters because if its all internal, the risk of a sarin shower on Tel Aviv is much lower. If its all Jordan and Turkey even those capitals are much safer; their destruction or opposition has never prominently figured in the carefully constructed BS narrative defining the supposed “struggle” of national liberation in that area. But Assad – and certainly the Kremlin – knows who is behind what. And those are the only people who have to worry about Syrian biochem rockets – there wouldn’t be any point to letting them off in a spasm of mass-mass murder. That’s just silly.
Of course there is the remote possibility that Russia, sensing we are taking out the USSR’s former Middle East possessions, has pulled some elaborate scheme to, while cannabilizing those assests before we can, set up reasonable conditions in the public imagination for a strategic WMD attack on Israel whereby Syria’s destruction coincides with a Samson-style bio-chemical blitz by Hezbollah and Damascus against urban Israel. After all these terror groups really aren’t aren’t cut out for taking over and ruling things, they’re weapons delivery platforms, whether for Allah or someone else less obvious.
I am wondering aloud here, but if you were the Muslim Brotherhood, what if the real prize is Saudi Arabia. I think about this in response to Spengler’s discussion of Egypt being ungovernable and its economy in collapse. I totally agree with this, and respect his learned position, but, if you are the MB, don’t you now control (or have influence) the area from Libya to the Sinai? This includes Libya’s oil and Egypt’s military. You also have strong ties to Al Qaeda who despise the Saudis. What would prevent the MB from going after them? They would control both sides of the Red Sea and have immense oil wealth.
Could they be allied with Iran? If so, they could control Syria, and its WMD’s, Jordan, wipe out Israel, etc.,
I am throwing this out there because I love the ideas/opinions generated on this site: Does this seem plausible and who would stop them?
The president elected in 2012 should strive to undo the decades of damage to America that began with FDR. Instead the next president will fight WW3, which resemble Thirty Years’ War in the brutality and length. Soon there will be no one left who has a personal memory of a non-socialist America. Even if we win the war, America will be lost.
Cowboy @ 5: “why Russia is so committed to Syria?”
Simple. To keep the US off balance. To create a level of irritation within our foreign policy sphere. “Look over here” while they do something else over there. To them, it’s an investment.
Eggplant @ 20: “Also an RV is still supersonic when it hits the ground.”
Not all RVs arrive at supersonic speeds. Depends on the RV’s shape. Blunt RVs arrive at subsonic speeds.
Scott Ritter didn’t bully hard enough to get to the truth… Should have punched Iraqi base guards who feigned ignorance of Russian-Syrian-Iraqi-bio-scud-weapons program.
Anonymous @ 26 said:
“Not all RVs arrive at supersonic speeds. Depends on the RV’s shape. Blunt RVs arrive at subsonic speeds.”
Modern military RVs (11 deg. cone half-angle) are not blunt and impact at supersonic speed. Old fashioned IRBM/ICBM RVs like the Mk-2 that did not use an ablative thermal protection system were blunt and could have a subsonic terminal velocity. However nobody uses that sort of RV anymore because they’re too easy to track and shoot down with an antiballistic missile system. Also there were the General Electric RVs used with low orbit satellites for film return but those were never intended for use as weapons. Those RVs deployed a parachute to enable recovery by low flying aircraft. NASA RVs such as used for Stardust and Genesis could reach subsonic terminal velocity but were not designed for military payloads.
The best bio weapons delivery systems are the drug smuggling subs coming from central America.
Lace the Cocaine, the Pot and heroin with what ever you wish to kill with and turn it loose on the American drug users who would then spread it every where they go.
You could sail one into a crowded harbor or bay and even release Sarin or other chemicals and let it drift ashore with the wind.
Israel has made some significant preparations for Syrian WMD use, including distributing gas masks, inoculations, stockpiling vaccines, and requiring homes to be built with air tight shelters. They just deployed a patriot battery near haifa, and could move some iron dome up north if needed to counter short range incoming fire.
I would imagine if Syria gets real bad, Israel will destroy all the known WMD and missile sites. They would still have to worry about terrorists smuggling leftovers to the palestinians, but there would be no widespread threat.
I would worry more for the US, since Hizballah has been active in smuggling from Mexico for years. Over here we have not taken any serious measures against bio/chem other than inoculating military personnel.